Shoreline Professor Dies After Seattle Stabbing

Troy Wolff, Shoreline Community College professor, died early Saturday after trying to protect his partner in a random stabbing in the Pioneer Square neighborhood, according to Shoreline Community College.

See photos of Troy Wolff on Shoreline Community College's Flickr page.

According to the college, Wolff, 46, was walking with his partner, Kristin Ito, in the Pioneer Square neighborhood after attending a Sounders soccer game at CenturyLink Field.

“This is an unbelievably tragic loss,” Interim President Daryl Campbell said, according to the Shoreline Community College press department. “Troy was loved by students, loved by his fellow faculty members, loved by all who knew him.”

The college was already reeling with the loss of faculty academic advisor Erin Walker, who died July 25, in a car accident in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. Walker's local memorial service is at 3 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 15 in Seattle.

Read more at Shoreline Community College.

Wolff became a full-time professor at Shoreline in 2001 after starting out as a part-time instructor in 1996. Besides teaching, he is the author of "Seattle and King County: Gateway to the Pacific Northwest," and "Seattle: The Emerald City," according to Shoreline Community College. He also was the English department chair.

According to the Seattle Police Department blotter, Wolff and Ito, 30, were walking in the 300 block of South Jackson Street when a man approached and suddenly started stabbing her with a small knife.

Wolff intervened, and the man turned on him and stabbed him in the neck and torso, according to the police department.

Ito was in stable condition at Harborview Medical Center.

Police officers from the SWAT and Gang units arrived on scene and the man dropped the knife and was taken into custody without further incident, according to the police department.

The man arrested was booked into the King County Jail for Investigation of Murder, according to the Seattle Police Department.

Read more at the Seattle Police Department Blotter blog.